The floriculture industry has grown expo from its inception in the nineteenth century to a multibillion dollar industry today. After flowers are harvested, among other procedures, flowers are regularly packaged and transported to wholesalers and/or vendors.
Commonly, fresh cut flowers are shipped from harvest to wholesalers and/or vendors in containers where the flowers are bunched together and arranged in a plurality of layers with the stems of one bunch of flowers opposing the stems of another bunch of flowers. Additionally or alternatively, devices may be used to transport flowers that can include a plastic sleeve in which a bunch of flowers or each flower is arranged in between layers of filler, such as newspaper or shredded paper, a conical paper container that has a plurality of spaced tear-shaped openings for holding flower stems, a continuous strip that is rolled so that that flowers are isolated from one another, flexible paper coverings to protect flower petals, cardboard sleeves for receiving stems and water-proof wrappers covering the stems of flowers. However, these devices, while useful to protect the flowers, do not provide a means of efficient water delivery to hydrate and prolong the life of the flowers.
As a result of transporting flowers without water, flowers regularly arrive at wholesalers and/or retailers in a dehydrated state. To hydrate and prolong the life of flowers, the stems are regularly trimmed and the flowers are placed in water in a refrigeration unit, away from direct sunlight, soon after they arrive at retail location.
To transport the flowers, the stems of the flowers may be placed in individual vials filled with water, the stems can be placed in a vase with water, the stems can be arranged in a plastic bag containing water that is secured to the stems or in some instances an arrangement of flowers is simply transported without an form of hydration.
However, no simple, easy-to-use, non-damaging and inexpensive device or method exists to cover each stem to ensure that each fresh cut flower is hydrated during wholesale shipment and/or delivery from a retail location to a customer. Additionally, no device or method exists to hydrate the stems of hand-held bouquets of fresh cut flowers while at the same time ensuring that water does not drip or spill from the bouquet and/or that the bouquet does not require to be stored in a vase or bucket of water.